Pangolins are fascinating prehistoric scaled ant-eaters and have been around for at least 80 million years, (compared to homo sapiens who have been around for only 8 million). They are the only animal to be completely covered in scales and they are extremely shy curling up in a ball if startled, useful against a fox, useless against heartless poachers. What makes it worse is that they barely survive in captivity making their conservation very difficult. Their scales are used in traditional Asian medicine and their meat is considered (by some) a great delicacy, so they are just collected and butchered in their thousands and conservationists are trying to raise awareness before they are literally eaten into extinction. They live in parts of Africa and Asia but not being in any zoo (as they require very specialist care), you may never have even seen a Pangolin before, but if we don't support the work to stem the trade in Pangolin scales and meat - you nor anyone else will ever get the chance. They are interesting and sensitive with distinct personalities, according to the little I have read about them... if you got a nice discount on your black friday shopping, perhaps you'd give the difference to help protect the pangolin? How to help save Pangolins, one good way is to donate to the International Union for Conservation of Nature ICUM-Pangolin Specialist group! Meet Bodie and Doyle. Booooadie as pronounced by their Scottish boss man Cowley, is the one on tippy toes and he especially likes the fight scenes, I think, I mean, I get that impression. He's also really good at pouting menacingly, while Doyle is supposed to be the softer character. However, it is my assessment that Bodie is actually soft in the middle. Oh and don't (or do) google these guys or (as) you will find all sorts of slash fiction of them being a couple, which is actually really cute because clearly the whole programme is based on their excellent camaraderie and loyalty slash humour slash girl hunting japes, with an undertone of it really sucks being an intelligence operative because you don't have a life, own your own life or get paid (reasonably) for the trouble, all they have is each other (which makes up for everything, aw). It's a bit like if the whole James Bond dynasty wasn't a total pile of sh*t imagine that! JB! urgh makes me angry just thinking about it - stupid films: stupid aesthetic: the money, the gloss, assumptions about class, him as a sex symbol (!?), killing like sneezing, oh and I'm basically a sociopath - a role model, great. Personally I'd rather go to bed with Inspector Clouseau. Anyway, Ci5 still has plenty of killing and its probably not the best thing to spend your time watching on balance, but I wanted to practice drawing 'action' scenes (running etc). I do wonder if other artists use the TV as a reference or inspiration for practicing new styles or scenarios. I have this horrible voice in my head which tells me I should be able to draw anything from nowhere, which - sorry- not able to do that just yet (if ever). Maybe it's a closely guarded secret how artists (really work) as in where they start from - perhaps its like you'll lose your mystique if you say - hey I have to draw it 5 times in rough, or hey I have to use a reference , or hey I've been drawing transformers for 15 years now and even dream about them (OHKAYTHEN) or perhaps I am just doing it differently - probably not! Eisner used photo references, and that was before you could get ANY PHOTO OF ANY THING EVER from the internet.. I know disney artists would use the people in the office or their wives as models to draw from... But say - someone swinging on a rope, before the internet, would be quite hard to reference, and so back to the are you a good enough artist to draw JUST ANYTHING out of nowhere and it look and feel realistic enough to work? I'd love to get there one day. Vincent Woodcock who taught the short course I did at St Martins in character design, who drew pretty much only Disney style cartoon cartoons, not realistic at all but definitely appealing, could draw anything - but then it would be made of shapes, abstracted, not based on observation. I'd say his style is so stylised you'd always know what you're going to get. My work is not stylised that way... maybe it will be one day, but at the moment, I really like to vary.
It takes a long time to become an artist. I've been drawing all my life and yet I still feel like I haven't quite worked it out. Moebius (probably my favourite artist along with most people's I am sure) said something along the lines that you never stop learning, when people told him he was great he'd have to think ah shadup because if you feel like you've 'arrived' then that's the time to worry! OK, but a little arriving is nice though. - This isn't the article I was remembering but it's pretty awesome and appropriately the 70's again! - so have a read (the first one esp.) if you share my love of Moebius/Gir/Jean Luc Goddard. Some of the things he says about 'gut instincts' determining what to draw - having meaning or soul be it good/or bad is how I chose what to draw, not always coming out exactly how I want but (nearly) always starting from a place of expression of something strongly felt inside. Nearly every episode features at least one rooftop chase, car chase, stair-way shooting, located in an abandoned air base/industrial site/shipping yard. There'll usually be at least three fight scenes which as far as I can tell are performed by the actors themselves and of course the obligatory shoot out, followed by a clanging one liner to round you off.
I scanned and coloured these sketches of extremely at the time hard hitting 70's/80's intelligence drama 'Ci5: The Professionals' in which there are little friendly looking cars and satisfying old fashioned technology, funky clothes and hilarious one liners. Surprisingly good and possibly how our kids will view '24' or 'Spooks' in another 10-20 years. Terrible mostly and a time capsule for the most part. The shots of London from back in 1979 are amazing and clearly the programme makers were going for the whole 'what is the world coming to' vibe. Dereliction, organised crime and corruption. Nice. Camera angles are straight out of a silver-age comic book and endlessly appealing hence me capturing screen shots and drawing them - but what really really sells it to me is the music! Agh its just so, 70's. I suppose it was just 'tension building' film score music at the time but now it sounds more like a psychadellic paisley pastiche of the mood it's trying to conjure and consequently the whole programme just makes me grin from ear to ear despite its (realistically) gritty content. Perhaps its just reassuring to be reminded that we had terrorism, corruption and gun crime in the 70s too, and we're still here now, a little more sophisticated technologically and thankfully a little less machismo (one hopes).
As you can see these are all a bit rough, sketches photographed on my phone then messed about with. Will probably sort out some better versions later.
It strikes me that there are some similarities between Nazism and Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL), both groups of right wing extremists, born out of humiliation and post-war chaos, ambitions for global conquest with twisted religious narratives, youth recruitment, brainwashing, enslavement of women for sexual use, indiscriminate killing with incredible brutality creating societies propped up by fear, totalitarianism and ideological banality. Opportunists who will change their tune in a beat to get more recruits, more power. So of course, they are also just irrational, gone-insane criminals and fear-mongers.
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